5.  The applicant was born in 1937 and lives in Cetinje (Montenegro).
6.  On 15 October 1991 the Titograd Court of First Instance (Osnovni sud u Titogradu) gave judgment no. P-437/87 ordering the companies C.O. and P. – both incorporated under Croatian law and with their head offices in Croatia – to pay the applicant jointly and severally damages in the total amount of 600,000 Yugoslav dinars for injuries sustained in a road traffic accident, together with accrued statutory default interest and the costs of proceedings. The judgment became final on 6 January 1992.
7.  On 16 October 2001 the applicant instituted non-contentious proceedings before the Koprivnica Municipal Court (Općinski sud u Koprivnici) seeking that the above foreign judgment be recognised in Croatia.
8.  On 20 November 2001 the Municipal Court accepted the applicant's request and issued a decision recognising the Montenegro court's judgment.
9.  On 4 March 2002 the applicant applied for rectification of that decision because it incorrectly stated that the case number of the recognised judgment was P-437/97 instead of P-437/87.
10.  On 13 March 2002 the Koprivnica Municipal Court issued a decision rectifying the error. It served it on the applicant's representatives two days later.
11.  Meanwhile, on 3 December 2001 the applicant instituted enforcement proceedings before the Koprivnica Municipal Court against the companies C.O. and P. by submitting an application for enforcement of the recognised judgment.
12.  On 6 February 2002 the court issued a writ of execution (rješenje o ovrsi) by garnishment of funds from the debtors' bank accounts.
13.  The judgment debtors appealed, arguing that number P-437/97 figured in the decision on recognition as a number of the recognised judgment while the actual number of the judgment sought to be enforced was P-437/87. In his reply, the applicant submitted that the decision on recognition contained a clerical error, that he had applied for its rectification and that the proceedings instituted thereby were still pending.
14.  On 16 April 2002 the Koprivnica County Court (Županijski sud u Koprivnici) quashed the writ of execution of 6 February 2002 and remitted the case. It held that the decision on recognition of the foreign judgment indeed contained the number P-437/97 as a number of the recognised judgment whereas the judgment sought to be enforced had the number P-437/87. The court observed that this discrepancy might have been caused by a clerical error but nevertheless quashed the writ of execution, giving precedence to the principle of strict formal legality in enforcement proceedings. The second-instance decision was served on the applicant's representatives on 10 May 2002.
15.  In the resumed proceedings, on 13 June 2002 the Koprivnica Municipal Court issued an instruction, which the applicant's representatives received four days later, inviting him to submit within fifteen days the proper enforcement title (that is, the judgment with the same number as the one stated to be the number of the recognised judgment in the decision of 20 November 2001) or a rectified decision on recognition.
16.  As the applicant failed to do so, on 6 August 2002 the court declared his application for enforcement inadmissible.
17.  The applicant appealed and enclosed that court's decision on rectification of 13 March 2002 (see paragraph 10 above).
18.  On 17 September 2002 the Koprivnica County Court dismissed the applicant's appeal. It held that the first-instance decision to declare the application for enforcement inadmissible was justified, given that the applicant had failed to satisfy the request of the first-instance court even though he could have done so as he had been in possession of the rectified decision at the relevant time. The second-instance decision was served on the applicant's representatives on 15 October 2002.
19.  The applicant then lodged a constitutional complaint against that decision, which the Constitutional Court (Ustavni sud Republike Hrvatske) dismissed on 17 September 2004.
20.  Meanwhile, on 24 December 2002 the applicant instituted the second enforcement proceedings before the Koprivnica Municipal Court against the judgment debtors by resubmitting his application for enforcement together with the rectified decision on recognition.
21.  On 7 March 2003 the court issued a writ of execution by garnishment of funds from the debtors' bank accounts.
22.  The debtors appealed, arguing that the enforcement had become time-barred, given that the ten-year statutory limitation period running from the finality of the judgment sought to be enforced had elapsed on 6 January 2002. In reply, the court instructed them, pursuant to the Enforcement Act, to institute separate civil proceedings before it against the applicant with a view to declaring the enforcement inadmissible.
23.  After these civil proceedings ended in the applicant's disfavour (see paragraphs 25-29 below), on 10 December 2004 the Koprivnica Municipal Court issued a decision discontinuing the enforcement proceedings.
24.  The applicant appealed, but his appeal was dismissed by the Koprivnica County Court on 25 January 2005.
25.  On 19 May 2003 the judgment debtors, companies C.O. and P., brought a civil action against the applicant in the Koprivnica Municipal Court, seeking to have the enforcement declared inadmissible.
26.  On 8 June 2004 the Koprivnica Municipal Court gave judgment for the plaintiffs, finding that the enforcement was time-barred and thus inadmissible.
27.  On 28 September 2004 the Koprivnica County Court dismissed an appeal by the applicant and upheld the first-instance judgment.
28.  The courts held that the applicant's request of 16 October 2001 for recognition of a foreign judgment instituting the relevant non-contentious proceedings had not interrupted the running of the statutory limitation period within which the enforcement of the recognised judgment could have been sought. The courts held so because they considered that a judgment debtor was not a party to such proceedings and was thus unaware that a judgment creditor had undertaken steps to enforce the judgment. The courts also noted that the applicant had not used the opportunity to institute enforcement proceedings directly – a step that would certainly have interrupted the running of the statutory limitation period – in which case the recognition of the enforcement title could have been decided incidentally as a preliminary issue in those proceedings. Lastly, the courts noted that the applicant had instituted the first enforcement proceedings within the ten-year statutory limitation period but that they had ended with a decision declaring his application for enforcement inadmissible, in which case, pursuant to section 389(2) of the Obligations Act, they did not interrupt the running of the limitation period.
29.  The applicant then lodged a constitutional complaint against the second-instance judgment, alleging violations of his constitutional rights to a fair hearing, equality and property. On 20 April 2005 the Constitutional Court dismissed his constitutional complaint.